A commenter on another entry coughed this up...
"How are you any different than Nikki Finke when it comes to Fox and Vantage? There's no variation on your shtick, and it's not based on reality or facts. "Fox isn't as bad as you think." "Vantage is on the verge of collapse." You've been repeating some variation on those two statements forever, as if you say it enough times it will suddenly become true or be accepted as fact." Rothchild
Well... first the personality stuff.
Just because you say that I am not basing my comments on facts does not make it so. I offer facts out the buttocks over and over. If you don't care to believe the facts, that's your issue. Not mine.
So here we go again... please feel free to disagree with said facts and/or my interpretation... or just keep throwing mud. Your call.
Vantage is not on the verge of collapse. Vantage is, essentially, a former division playing out its pipeline. Is there some factual reason you disagree (other than "the studio or Nikki told you so")... or do you just want to bark?
As for Fox... again... details. Fox appears to have a very strong 2009 ahead. If X-Men Origins: Wolverine / Night at the Museum II / Ice Age 3 go into August looking like Superman Returns, Poseidon, and Lady in the Water, you can bet that I will be right there calling for Tom Rothman’s head... for cause... not over personality or a narrow view of his tenure's success.
The huge difference between the issue of Fox and the issue of Vantage is that the failure of one and the failure of the other are not comparable in any real way. Vantage was a start-up, focused on quality “indie” filmmaking and not necessarily profit. Vantage as a breakeven would have been a win for Paramount. But it lost a fortune, even though many of the movies were excellent and/or truly ambitious.
Fox, as a major studio, is in a completely different business. The studio is built to risk more, with less interest in quality than revenue, with the goal of bigger gains. (If I am sounding patronizing, my apologies… but you don’t seem to get it.)
No one year defines a major studio. It cannot. (Nor can grosses without the benefit of knowing costs or awards.)
And if you look at Fox over the last two years, it will be very apparent why. By year end, there is a real chance that Fox 2008 will have the identical domestic box office as Fox 2007. Yes, there will be seven more films this year, but that difference can mostly be attributed to movies that Fox’s financial stake in was significantly less than releases in years past (or not their money at all).
Of course, domestic box office is not the whole story. Foreign is, in most cases, more significant. But with two movies to go – one looking a lot stronger international than domestic – Fox is only $230 million behind last year’s film’s totals.
All that said, Fox will eat a lot of dollars on Australia and Meet Dave. They will take losses on X Files: I Want To Believe, and Jumper (in spite of $222m worldwide… I don’t believe their cost claim is close).
They will be highly profitable on Horton Hears A Who!, 27 Dresses, and What Happens in Vegas.
Pretty much everything else is marginally either a loser or winner, often because of the investment of others, whether Walden or Media Rights or some international deals. This was not as intended... so not a positive... but no disaster either.
And going back to year-to-year realities… Fox had home runs with some pretty iffy movies in 2007 (and I don’t hold Rotten Tomatoes as the ultimate arbiter of quality) and people were raving about how great the year was. Fox’s line-up this year made a lot of similar efforts… and pretty much every one tanked vs expectations.
This was a down year, no question. No one is going to give Fox a parade this year. Nor should they. But perspective is always called for.
One year you get a massively more successful than expected The Simpsons Movie. The next year, you get X-Files 2. (And yes... I am sure that YOU knew this would happen... zzzzz... yes, we should all be running studios instead of those idiots who do...zzzz...) You invest in M. Night Shyamalan and like everyone else has, you live with him doing as he likes… and you more than double his last film… but it’s still only his second film since The Sixth Sense not to get to $250m worldwide… so even though you are well into breakeven, it’s seen as another disaster. You have two rom-com cash cows… and no one is talking about anything but Sex & The City.
What is WB’s #2 film for the year? 10,000 BC. $269m worldwide. So… what’s the difference between that and Fox’s #2 film (Jumper, with $222m worldwide)? The difference, in perception, is The Dark Knight. Take Batman and New Line off of the WB box office chart and you have a bad year. Of course, you can’t take Batman off the list… and you shouldn’t. New Line, you must. (And what an irony that New Line will have 3 highly profitable films this year after being shut down.) But you need to keep in perspective that ONE success is often the difference between a bad year, a mediocre year, and a great year… in perception.
Want to go #3 vs #3 with WB vs Fox? Get Smart vs What Happens In Vegas. The WB title got better reviews and grossed $10 million more worldwide. Smart cost at least $50 million more than Vegas. So which would you prefer at your studio?
I’m not trying to just rip on WB. They did have The Dark Knight. And it counts. Just like Superman Returns counts… same idea… arty director for a superhero movie… money loser. Just as X-Men and X-Men 2 and X-Men 3 still count. Just as it matters who made the profits on Iron Man and who took the losses on The Incredible Hulk. So is Marvel the company of the future or is it an undisciplined spender in danger of overreaching? The facts, while not always embraced by the media, are still the facts… whether you like them or not.
And again… don’t get me wrong… it was a crap year for Fox. And Australia’s box office demise is the rancid cherry on top. (The reviews for The Day The Earth Stood Still ain’t going to send anyone to bed with a smile either.) There will be write-downs this year.
But when you start comparing it to Vantage… well, you can’t. Everything Vantage could have ever expected to happen in their favor pretty much happened. And they still lost a ton on money. And so, that experiment ended.
And if there is a reason for me to keep pointing at Vantage – forget the delusion that they are really a working business at this point – it is because they led an indie movement with their much higher rate of spending that was no small part of dragging the Dependents down and the true independents with them this last year. Great movies? Perhaps. But if you make There Will Be Blood and it gets the BP nomination and it wins Best Actor and you still lose tens of millions? Sorry. You know who could afford that? A major studio… with a few big dumb hits to support the loss. But it is a recipe for disaster if you are in the specialized business.
Back to Fox… Rothman (and the oft forgotten Jim Giannopoulos) were on top of the world last year. And this year they are the whipping boys. And this next year… well, we will see.
Perspective. And yes, facts.
Your turn.
Read the complete post at http://www.mcnblogs.com/thehotblog/archives/2008/12/why_foxs_bad_ye.html